SPN100 Challenge - FOND MEMORIES & NEVERENDING TEARS
by Chick Feed
Summary: Word: Stream - All the good times are held safely in Sam's dreams. Reality can wait...


SPN100 Challenge **_(EXTRA, just because)_** Wow : Stream  
Words : A small amount of many  
SPOILER ALERT: set after S3 final ep.

Disclaimer: They would be, if wishes came true &amp; Mr Kripe was feeling ever so generous towards freaky fanfic writers.

For the totally ace Azalea growing **_ncsupnatfan  
_****FOND MEMORIES &amp; NEVERENDING TEARS  
**_All the good times are held safely in Sam's dreams. Reality can wait...  
_-oOo-

Faded, brittle coils of old paper streamers brushed against Sam's face as he cautiously stepped through an open doorway, into the darkened room beyond. Inside, a small pool of light spotted down on him. Sam paused, waiting silently, walking further into the room when nothing happened, the single spot-light stalking him. Sam hesitated, uncertain, until around him, the rest of the room gradually filled with daylight.

"_Surprise_! Happy birthday Sammy."

"Happy sixteenth son."

Sam instantly recognised his surroundings, and the event. He smiled at his brother and father standing together in front of the room's small dining table. Dean held out a clear plastic beaker full of dark red liquid.

"Here you go bro'. Birthday punch, made it myself."

Sam laughed, recalling his lines.

"You did?"

He glanced at his dad, heart lurching to see him there, alive, and looking slightly embarrassed.

"Dad? Is this stuff safe?"

John relaxed somewhat and he stared down into his own drink suspiciously.

"Really wouldn't like to say."

Sam watched Dean roll his eyes and raise his glass. Sam recalled how determined Dean had been to make this work. Birthdays generally came and went with little, if any, recognition. But it was Sam's sixteenth, and Dean had decided it was going to be marked. For weeks he had harried their father. Nagging, begging, monitoring the jobs John took nearer the day, wanting to ensure John had no reason to stay away, even threatening to tell Bobby if John wasn't there. Guilt about the birthdays, Thanks-Giving and Christmases missed, John had conceded. In his dream, Sam re-lived the time when they all stood in a motel room be-decked with handmade streamers, drinking Dean's punch to which he had added a goodly amount of vodka, gin and who knows what?

-o-

Sam's smile grew broader while he and Dean touched beakers, he couldn't help glancing back at the dining table, where Dean's masterpiece sat hidden out of sight behind his dad. This time Sam sipped his punch, avoiding the _actual_ day's choking fit and streaming eyes. John's eyes suddenly opened wide as he chugged down his own punch and he gasped.

"_Dean_! What the Hell's _in_ this?"

"Can't say, it's an ancient Winchester secret recipe...Handed down from me to me this mornin'."

Dean went for distraction before John could respond.

"_Present time_!"

-o-

Sam carefully unwrapped the gleaming gold paper stuck down with brown parcel tape, knowing already what was inside. Dean had bought him a silver identity bracelet, "wittily" engraved with _To my big baby brother Sammy - 16._

In his sleep Sam frowned, wondering when he had last seen the bracelet? Still blocking Sam's view of the table, John held out the box containing his own gift to his youngest son. Wrapped in brown paper it had a gold ribbon matching Dean's gift wrap haphazardly stuck on top. Inside had been the first gun that was actually _his_. Another beaker of Dean's deadly punch, and it was show-time.

"Sammy, you stay put, I gotta shut the curtains for the next bit."

Dean ordered Sam to close his eyes. While he waited, Sam had chuckled at the hushed whispers between Dean and John and the giveaway clicking sounds.

"Ok...Sammy?...I'm gonna count to three, then you can open your eyes...One...Two..."

-o-

Sam's eyes slowly blinked open, they felt swollen and gritty. Gazing at the discoloured ceiling of his current motel room, his vision was already blurring with yet more tears. Rolling onto his side, Sam buried his face in his pillow, still too distraught to face the day; his third without Dean since his brother had been gutted, torn and his soul hauled into Hell.

**-oOo-  
**Chick xx  
_Reviews can be nearly as good as choccie. I've had no choccie today, please don't leave me without the other!_


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